Bait
by Shadow000
Summary: The game has changed. New rules. Worse odds. Higher stakes. Season 1 re-vamped. AU – Max doesn't escape.
1. Amendment

The game has changed. New rules. Worse odds. Higher stakes. Season 1 re-vamped. AU – Max doesn't escape.

**Bait**

The escape was Zack's idea. It was a seat of the pants decision and execution. The sort of thing Max, with her reactionary tendencies and impulsive streak a mile wide, might instigate but she had been too busy trying not to collapse from seizures.

This was fortunate. It meant she got off more lightly when the finger pointing started. She was just following orders. And she wasn't in the right frame of mind. It wasn't her fault. This wasn't necessarily true, but no one got out of psy-ops by telling the truth.

Max didn't make it out. She had gotten very close, made it so far, but with one miss-step on a frozen lake she found herself right back in Manticore. End game. It seemed unfair, but that was the story of her life. No do-overs. No second chances. Instead there was psy-ops and rehabilitation.

Sometimes it seemed like it happened to someone else – like maybe it was an urban legend from the Seattle facility or it was another unit. That's what psy-ops did to your mind. It was simpler to believe this. Less lonely. Max wished the best for them, but it painful thinking about them living it up out there while she rotted away in Manticore. Left behind.

Truth was, none of them had probably set eyes on each other in years. They split up that night and stayed separate for safety. They were living on the run, always looking over their shoulders, like mice scurrying from birds of prey. Living in the gutters and filth. Lonely too. This thought didn't make Max feel much better either.

Manticore wasn't so bad. Food, shelter and security. Lot to be said for that. The first few years were brutal, but that was mostly confined to the anniversary – a harsh reminder than an escape could never happen again. Max had never been called as a volunteer. The odds weren't stacked in her favour as an attempted escapee. Or with her track record.

Every designation went into the lotto once. This was true for every transgenic. But you could have repeats. Most did. An extra entry for each misdemeanour or failure. Escaping violated dozens of rules. Each counted for one entry. In '10, the first anniversary, Max's designation was in over 40 times. She didn't want to think about current total.

Three designations, one from each facility, were pulled out of the lotto to participate in cruciamentum. The volunteers (really, conscripts, you'd have to be insane to volunteer for this) competed in three tasks, designated to test strength, intelligence and endurance, judged by the director from each facility.

The venue rotated between facilities. The games varied, lasting from hours to weeks. Always brutal and fatal. The champion was the last one standing. They usually didn't staying standing for very long. Of the nine cruciametums, only one had survived. Two others might have, but they weren't smart enough to turn down the opportunity to attempt an escape – the prize for this last event being freedom. Failure meant death.

The cruciamentum was recorded. It was mandatory watching treated like a sporting event, pitting facilities against each other. They promised honour and glory for your facility. Everyone knew though that it was a reminder than another escape should never be attempted.

Next year was the tenth anniversary. It would be hosted at Wyoming. It would be a very special event. A more glorified version to make sure no one forgot why escaping was such a bad thing. It was twelve moths away and Max already had a sickening, twisting feeling in her stomach about it.

It might be an election this time. Or they could be specially chosen. Or there might be twice the volunteers. Something worse. As an attempted escapee, the first two meant her designation was inevitable and the last two just worsened her already bad odds. There was some poetic about sparing her until a big occasion. Her designation would be called. Volunteer was basically another word for corpse.

Max didn't want to die. She'd gotten a reputation for being fearless. But she was scared. It was one thing to die out in the field. That's what they were trained for. She wasn't worried about that. This was different. Dying in a humiliating, gruesome fashion and strung up as a lesson. She wasn't ready for that.

Theoretically, amends could be made and the number of designation entries could be reduced. This was another aspect of the game, keeping them all on edge, letting them know they had no control of their lives. Max didn't play along. That was when her calling was academic rather than rigged. This changed everything. It made she had to play. It was her only way to stay off the board.

"Max, sit down," said Lydecker, gesturing at the seat in front of his desk. He closed down his laptop and pinned her with his cold stare. "You wanted to see me."

"Yes sir," Max agreed. She paused. She hadn't given much thought to the words she would use. The wrong thing would give her an extra entry. "I want to make amendments."

"For what?" Lydecker's expression was unreadable.

"For everything."

"That will take a lifetime. You're a bit ambitious giving yourself ten months," he commented. "Now if you had a decade…"

Max swallowed a lump in her throat. "I'll do anything."

She wasn't sure what she was agreeing to. It was reckless to give such open terms. Lydecker could easily imagine something much worse than the tenth anniversary.

"I do have something in mind," Lydecker admitted. "You would be uniquely qualified to handle it, but you're also extremely like to fuck it up."

"I won't. I swear," Max promised immediately.

"You shouldn't make promises you can't keep," Lydecker advised. "Your amendment, should you choose to accept it, is to terminate or retrieve Ben."

Max was finding it very hard to breath. Like there was no oxygen in this room. It felt a bit like being under water. The words were distorted and muffled. Lydecker continued unwaveringly.

"He has become a liability. An anomaly. Our best intel suggests that he will develop into a serial killer and cause considerable damage to Manticore in the process. There are significant resources being put together to stop this. You could be one arm of this operation. Such as assignment would be voluntary. You will need to tell me right now either way."

A life for a life. Quid pro quo. It seemed like something Lydecker had in the pipeline, waiting for her to cave in and play the game. Winning didn't mean her life would be spared. She could go through all this and end up called. They weren't good terms. But they were her only terms.

It wasn't like Ben was doing her life out there right, going around murdering people. They hadn't escaped to become unhinged killers. It was a wasted life. Ending it, either directly or indirectly, wouldn't be that wrong, would it? The good folks of America would be that bit safer.

If Max were fearless, she'd tell Lydecker where to shove his offer. Spend the next year in a blaze of trouble, fun and recklessness and go out in flames at cruciamentum. Die as herself. Not as a piece in their games. Not a slave. Not 452. Die being Max.

But Max was scared. And she didn't want to die. She'd play along.

"I'll do it."

_Thoughts, feelings, opinions? It's a what if story. What if Max didn't escape? Cliff-notes version: she ends up in Seattle 2019 anyway still dealing with the same crap, with extra Manticore stuff thrown into the mix. Comment if you would like to see this written._


	2. Normal

There had been another two kills – both in Chicago. Max's orders were to hang out in Seattle, model herself as attractive psychopath bait and wait patiently for Ben. It would, however, make a lot more sense to get her butt to Chicago. Letting Ben leave a trail of toothless barcoded corpses in his wake defied op-sec in a major way. Max wasn't complaining about that; she'd much rather kill Ben later than sooner.

But she didn't like Lydecker suddenly, conveniently, disregarding op-sec. It was suspicious. Max was powerless though and tried not to think about this. There was no point tying herself up in knots about something she couldn't change. Max was better off keeping her head down and getting on with the job.

Officially, she was researching Ben's case and setting up an authentic runaway cover that would draw in Ben. This somehow needed weeks prep. This translated to working in a dodgy pawnshop in Seattle, dragging up dusty and half-forgotten memories from her childhood while pursing various articles and books of psychopathy.

"Nice book," remarked one guy. He was looking to buy a counter-top fan. He'd been in twice before, just browsing during Max's shift and attempting to haggle yesterday with her boss, Harry.

"Thick glasses, terrible vests, pain in the ass. Tell him to go to Hell, that he's not getting a single extra cent off," Harry had warned.

Max got verbal updates like this or post-its stuck on the til regularly. Since day one, Harry encouraged her to work on her bad attitude, develop it into something much worse.

"Bad cop, bad, cop," was Harry's business motto. "Keep looking like a good cop though, it throws them off, gives them the idea they can con you, when that's really our game play."

"Nice face," Max sneered without looking up from the thesis.

It seemed like a strange business strategy, but Max wasn't bought up to question things like this, especially if they seemed to work effectively. They were the type of orders she could get on board with.

"Pyschopathic personality in adolescence – genetic and environmental influences," the guy read, plucking the book out of her hands. He squinted at her. "You not a bit young to be a grad-student?"

"What would you know about grad school?" asked Max. She snatched the book back and put it down behind the counter away from his grubby hands.

"I have several doctorates," he said like they were as easy as having seven kids or shoes.

Max laughed. His expression didn't change. He was being serious. She looked him up and down. He _did_ look like a book person. It was a bit rich for him to call her young. He looked about thirty, which worked out about right for one doctorate but several placed him as a child prodigy in grad school.

"Well, _Doctor_," she drawled, "with all due respect, what the hell are you doing here looking for a cheap fan?"

He sneered. "A doctorate won't get you out of this job, not a wishy-washy psychology one. My advice is to quit while you're ahead _Missy_, spend that tuition money on a motorcycle. Be more use to you."

"Plan B is taking up applied self-directed psychopathy," Max quipped.

He sighed. "Just give me the damn fan."

"Seeing as you asked so nicely," Max muttered and set about organising the sale. No haggling. Just resignation. Summer in Seattle was sticky and hot; the fan was worth its price.

He paid full-price, and said that one of this messengers would collect in tomorrow. He tossed a creased business card on the counter. Ronald Regan, Jam Pony Express.

"Oh and, that author has been largely discredited. The thesis is a disaster. Small N numbers, poorly matched controls, inappropriate statistical tests, falsified data, plagiarised work – it got nothing right. I wouldn't waste your time," he called over his shoulder.

It seemed awfully convenient that an expert with several doctorates under his belt would casually wander into the shop and leave with this insight. But it was also far too blatant to be a message from Lydecker.

"Think of it as Black-ops," Lydecker had said before she left. "Off-the-books. Too many of the escapees have slipped by fingers through leaked information. As far as they're concerned, you're the real deal, one of them. That means no contact, briefings or orders. Make it authentic. Don't get any stupid notions though. We'll be watching."

The last guy was very low profile and ordinary. He traded in a violin in a fancy mahogany case and spun a sob story about his prodigy violinist daughter and that he'd get it back within a week. The case had a false bottom and contained the updated file. True to his word, he collected the violin. It was all quite average and straightforward.

Max had memorised the file and returned it to case. It contained details about the new kills that had been expertly hushed up by Manticore. This was the only contact she received in the last month.

If Regan wasn't Manticore, who was he? He was potentially a very interesting person to know, someone that could see things and make connections that Max could not. He was also the type of guy that could sell her out in a heartbeat. This meant Max had a side mission: get the low-down on Doctor Ronald Regan.

* * *

Regan went by Normal these days. It was a sarcastic moniker bestowed on Regan by one of his employees and had stuck. Regan wouldn't know normal if it came up to him with 2.5 kids and a white picket fence chatting about the weather and football pre-Pulse. He was an awkward outcast then, a controversial academic figure, and now an overqualified misfit, running a haphazard courier service.

None of his academic work specialised in psychology or psychiatry. His advice didn't stem from expertise, which focused on linguistics, anthropology, archaeology, and theology, but rather a general interest. It turned out to be spot-on too. He knew his stuff alright. Max spent hours pouring over Normal's life and work, trying to get into his head as a stepping-stone to get into Ben's head.

All she got was a vague conspiracy theory that Jam Pony was actually a sociology experiment Normal was both running and participating in and would end up in a journal in next few years. This, Max knew, was slightly crazy. It meant she had to stop reading and go visit Normal. Get facts.

"Not hiring. I've got enough deadbeat, no-good bums," said Normal, not bothering to glance up from his clipboard.

"Nice fan," said Max, angling it slightly so she could catch the cool air.

Normal slapped her hand away and re-positioned the fan towards himself. He looked up and scowled seeing Max. "It's mine," he said possessively.

Max held her hands up. "Yeah, whatever. And I'm not looking for a job either. I hear the boss is a jerk."

"What do you want?"

"Your brain," said Max. "You were right. I'm not a grad-student, but I am someone with a professional interest in psychopathy and you seem like an interesting person."

"You're not a grad-student, and you're not just a shop girl. What are you?"

"A genetically engineered Frankenstein killing machine," said Max sarcastically.

Normal rolled his eyes, but his eyes flickered off to the side, as if turning this over in his head as a possibility. He looked her up and down and shook his head, this possibility dismissed as crazy. Not so smart after all then.

"Why would I help you?" he asked after a pause.

Max shrugged. "Boredom? Curiosity? I don't know. Quid pro quo. Name your terms."

"Come back at 7 after business and we'll discuss it then," Normal said, hedging his bets.

He would agree. They both knew it. He had nothing better going on in his life. The only question was what he needed from Max. He'd probably have a couple of interesting ideas by closing, but nothing that Max couldn't handle.

"Alright," said Max.

* * *

Normal inherited Jam Pony from his father, who had died of a heart attack. He wouldn't have kept the place, but one couldn't afford to be picky in the aftermath of the Pulse. He figured he could keep it and run it until he could find a better job. Nine years later it was a life sentence. He never quite left academia, keeping up with new articles and work in his various fields, with the vague aim of publishing again someday.

This was why he recognised the thesis that girl in the pawnshop was reading. He was more intrigued by her though. Not the usual pawn shop employee. There was something markedly off about her. More clean-cut than the type that feed off the misery of others. It was the way she moved, the way she held herself, graceful and poised, deliberate and refined, like she was a ballerina or ninja. Maybe she was a psychopath in making or an intense method-actor.

Without a doubt, she was trouble and this gut feeling was confirmed when she appeared in Jam Pony with a business proposition. Trouble with a capital T, which he had plenty of already, but he was intrigued.

It was a joke, a throwaway comment – Frankenstein assassin. The sort of nonsense his employees invented to explain their absences and lateness. What if it wasn't? There was something preternatural about her even before this sarcastic comment. That's why Normal agreed to meet her later, see if he could suss out her back-story.

"She new blood?" asked Sketchy, checking out the girl as she left. He was half-slouched on the counter and slack-jawed.

"Something like that," Normal dismissed. He checked his clipboard and tossed a package at Sketchy. "Hot run, sector two. Get going."

He was half-distracted throughout the day and found himself with a backlog of receipts to be handled once he was alone. He didn't even notice to girl's arrival just that he once looked up and she was there, perched on the counter with her legs swinging, watching him steadily.

"What's your name anyway?" he asked.

She didn't react for a long moment, and then: "I'm Max."

It was the sort of reaction that made her answer seem like a lie – the hesitation, the blankness – but the name rolled off her tongue easily. Max was a strange one alright. That wasn't a hard question; if she wasn't lying, why the pause? It probably was lie so.

This was okay though. Normal just needed a name, to stop thinking of Max as just her or girl. A name established trust and rapport, key tools for getting to the bottom of her back-story.

"Give me your pitch, so I know what I'm working with," Normal said.

"There's this guy, let's call him Ben, he used to work for a particular facility and went rogue awhile back. He's been killing people and I'm looking for him," said Max.

A top-secret government facility. Messed up ex-agents. A manhunt. Normal was buying this. But how did Max enter the equation? She was awfully young to be an agent or analyst; probably wouldn't involve an outsider like himself either. She was something else - a wildcard. This made the entire premise even more tantalizing.

"What does that make you then?"

"His sister."

"Are you trying to protect him or capture him?"

Max flinched and looked down at her feet. "I want Ben to be safe. If he stopped this, laid low, they might go back to not prioritising him again."

This was dangerous territory. Stuff that Normal knew better than to get caught up it. He was a sucker for conspiracies and drama though. This was a by-product of too much bad TV while writing up various theses.

"What do you need me for then?"

"The plan is to lure him to Seattle and talk sense into him," said Max. "You sound like you might have ideas on how to achieve both of these things.

It was a stupid, misguided plan. Getting him into town was do-able, but stopping the brother? Not a hope. Desperate people didn't always see things clearly, even if they were armed with the relevant knowledge.

Max was a kid really, about the same age if not younger than Normal's messengers. In over her head. It was as ruthless to let her walk away as it was for him to exploit this. Except the latter would benefit Normal. Get brother Ben to Seattle and Normal could turn him in, get some cash for his troubles and maybe a ticket into a better job.

"I might," said Normal. "I'll need to know specifics."

"You'll get them if you agree," said Max.

This was fair enough. It would be reckless for Max to put all her cards on the table too soon. Honestly, it was reckless even approaching him, but desperate people were often reckless.

It was probably reckless for Normal to strike up this alliance, but wasn't everyone a bit desperate these days?

"Okay. Let's do this."

_A couple of people picked up on 'The Hunger Games' concept and I just wanted to say that it's mainly a plot device. It's a reason to get Max out of Manticore and on Ben's case and also why she doesn't just run away. It means she can be loyal but still consistent with cannon Max. It's not really a driving plot. Ultimately, it will re-surface, but this story isn't a crossover or Hunger Games re-done DA style. It's really a what-if. _

_Thanks for the comments so far. I'm still contemplating how warped to make season 1; my original idea is starting to seem too left-field so thinking of reigning it in a bit and playing things a bit more straight. How warped is too warped? What would you hate or love to see changed?  
_


	3. Normal II

_This is a short one. It didn't turn out like I planned, meaning that it's really an extension of the previous chapter rather than a chapter in itself. I'll let it stand alone for now so that it's obviously a new section, but I'll merge it with the previous one down the road. Speaking of the road, I haven't been writing this story in order meaning that I've written loads, but I can't upload it yet._

"You never said what you wanted from this arrangement," Max reminded Normal.

"Work for me," said Normal.

"In Jam Pony?" Max clarified. She liked well-defined terms and roles. He could mean housekeeper, personal assistant, or any number of other sleazy tasks. Not that sleazy was a deal breaker, but no need to sign up for that if she could do something more honest.

"Yes. Not as a messenger, but manager. Part time," said Normal.

"Keep your friends close and your enemies closer, huh?" asked Max.

Not that they were enemies exactly. For her, Normal was a person of interest, but she was hardly an innocent stranger to him. Her brother was a serial killer. That shit was often genetic. You play it careful with relatives.

"It's convenient. It makes these little meetings legit and boring rather than something scandalous. I've been meaning to scale back my responsibilities, get an extra set of hands in, while you're around you'll do."

"Yeah alright," said Max. "I'll need to give Harry a week's notice."

She wasn't that attached to her job at the pawnshop. It was only ever temporary anyway. She'd have to do something to justify the part-time job. School? She could major in human genetics for kicks and giggles or do something related to killers to justify her appearance at Ben's crime scenes. It didn't matter yet. She'd figure it out later.

"That's fine. Drop by tomorrow to sign the contract," said Normal.

It seemed strange that Normal didn't get an internal to act as part-time manager. Getting someone completely unqualified and inexperienced in off the streets seemed outrageous, but the staff didn't seem to care very much or that was the impression Max got the next day filling out the paper work. It

"You don't look like a smuck. How did Normal convince you to take this job?" asked a floppy haired lanky guy, Sketchy.

"It's a decent job," said Max.

"Yeah, if your last job was working for the devil himself."

This wasn't that far from the truth. Lydecker nicely fit the role of the devil in the hell that was Manticore. Normal might be annoying and smug but he wasn't a bad person. At worst, verbal abusive and uncompassionate, but that was Lydecker in a happy fun mood.

"If it's that bad, why don't you look for a new job?"

"Original Cindy hates to burst your bubble, sugga, but we're all looking for new jobs," chimed in a second voice. It was a tall woman with an afro and an apparent tendency to speak in third person.

Sketchy nodded. "I'll give you two days of putting up with abuse from Normal, customers and us for crappy pay before you get what we're saying."

"Forewarned is forearmed," said Max."Thanks for the heads up, guys. Looking forward to your abuse."

She finished off the final bit of her paperwork and returned it back to the Normal, at the dispatch counter. "Contract. Sector pass. Application form. Aptitude quiz. Liability form. Gag agreement. All signed in duplicate. Do you want a personal statement too? It wasn't this hard getting into university."

"That's because you went to a mickey-mouse trade school or Christian college," said Normal. "Then, dropped-out. You might as well have joined the circus."

"They teach you how to be psychic when you get those magic letters behind your name? Or just a snob?" said Max.

"Educated guess," said Normal. He flipped through the paper work quickly. "You can read and got a G.E.D so you've got most of this lot beat anyway."

"Hey Normal, we can read, yo, just not your girly curly handwriting," called Sketchy.

Since when was reading and writing cursive a specialist skill? It seemed to be one of the more normal things they taught kids at Manticore. It seemed obsolete out in the real world these days. Max filled out the paperwork this way unless it specified capital letters. Mistake number one. She was already an imposer and she hadn't started yet. For all the strange skills they taught at Manticore, they didn't do a good job on how to be normal.

"The paperwork isn't official. I'm turning it into a transfer to the university here," said Max. "Your guesses probably need a couple more letters after them, get more educated."

His educated guesses were exactly what she was relying on to getting into Ben's mind, but goddamn it she wished he was wrong. Max had never gone to college, it wasn't like she had any tells, just a fabricated back-story that he someone predicted (before looking at the forms). He must be smarter than she gave him credit for.

Perhaps smart enough to threaten Manticore from the sanitized and edited story she would supply him. Realistically, she should make sure Normal suffered at tragic accident once all this was over. It was the responsible and safe course of action. However, the scientist handing out the genes encoding the ability to coldly murder must have given her share to Ben though because Max wasn't very good at killing people.

She did, of course, what other choice did she have? Psy Ops would have a field day with that so it was a case of suck it up and kill. Most of them were scum, which made it easier, but Normal wasn't scum. Just a guy with bad luck.

Girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do though.


	4. Planning

"Let's just address some of the basics first, some of the key characteristics and risk factors for serial killers and psychopaths. You're blaming it on this facility, but it was probably something always there ready to be triggered. We find the trigger, we find his motivation and the pattern and then Ben. I need an idea of who he is and why and how."

"Okay. Shoot."

Without the whole truth, Normal was only reinventing the wheel, adding an extra person going around in circles trying to figure out Ben. It was better than nothing. He was an unbiased outsider, he might notice some extra detail or make connections that she could not.

"Was Ben adopted? Physically or emotionally abused by your parents? A bed-wetter? Above average intelligence?"

Normal rattled out the questions and waited with his pen poised over a notepad for Max's answers. He gestured impatiently with his hand. "Simple yes no questions. Keep up."

"No. Um, yeah I guess. It's complicated, but yeah it probably falls under abuse. No to the bed wetting, but wicked smart," said Max after a delay.

She shifted and toyed with her sleeve hems. She wasn't just telling Normal about Ben. By extension, she was revealing herself and it made her vulnerable. She didn't want his pity.

"You don't feel these urges do you? Or feel like you were born with a part of yourself missing? It can be his genetics or up-bringing thing or both. Any family history of violence or murder?"

"No…"

Not yet anyway. Ben could be the sole anomaly, or they might all be ticking time bombs ready to implode. That day in the woods got very messy. Lydecker himself was disturbed. It never happened again. Not like that. Max had written it off as a fluke. She couldn't speak for the others, but she didn't enjoy killing.

"Hmm. Were the victims vulnerable people like runaways or prostitutes? Were they completely unconnected to Ben? Was the method of killing symbolic?"

"No, yes and yes."

"Elaborate."

"They were just normal people with families, jobs and friends. Different ages, genders, races, socio-economic status, hobbies, but you know, regular folk. I don't know think Ben knew them. Otherwise the organisation would have tracked them down already. It's a very distinctive killing, but I can't really tell you what."

"Right. Did he hear voices or have an obsession with anything? Pornography? Clowns? God? Maths? Trains? Authority figures? Anything? Suffer any childhood traumas or imaginary friends?"

"No voices. There was this thing though. A woman in a picture. She wasn't an imaginary friend. She didn't talk or exist really. It was like an idea or a myth. It was pretty important to him. "

"That's it. Everything he is doing, it's because of this woman."

"He described her as honourable and strong and pure. She wasn't exactly an evil sinister presence. It was harmless," Max protested.

She wasn't disagreeing as such. The teeth made it pretty clear that it was related to the Blue Lady, but Max didn't get it. The Blue Lady was their version of the tooth fairy. They believed for a while and then they grew up. It was a nice story. It wasn't one that led onto someone ripping other people's teeth out. Except in Ben's head that was. How did that happen?

"And then he grew up and she changed. Memories and ideas are vulnerable. You said that they did something to him. It's probably a side effect."

They were all treated the same. Manticore was equal opportunities in that way, no favourites or victims. Or, at least, her unit was treated the same. There were different standards amongst units resulting in different training and expectations, but this was between and not within units. If Manticore were to blame, all her former unit would be on the same slippery slope as Ben, including Max herself. That meant it was something on the outside that set Ben off.

"There were others too. They believed in the woman. For a while anyway. They seem to be okay," said Max. She wasn't sure how to phrase this without implicating herself or inventing a whole bunch of siblings that would stretch the credibility of her back-story.

"People are different. Identical twins sharing a bedroom, for example, same genetics and environment, one of them is schizophrenic and the other healthy. Or one is an athlete and the other a scientist. Tell me the myth."

Max hesitated. "I can't. I'm could be putting you in danger by saying anything let alone going into specifics."

"I'm an adult. I can make that call for myself. It's my life to endanger," said Normal.

There it was. Permission to kill him for getting in too deep. She didn't have to feel guilty now. This was a fun little academic puzzle for Normal. For the first time in years, he could put his sociology and theology expertise into use.

"Don't come crying to me when you're dead then," said Max.

In a way, she wanted to tell someone. It was constantly going around in her head, the same circles over and over again. And she was blinded by Ben's virtue to see events clearly. Normal, however, was an unbiased outsider. It would be easier for him to help her rather than her floundering alone.

Max traced shapes onto the tabletop between them and avoided Normal's stare as she recounted the origins of the Blue Lady. It wasn't the entire truth. She wrote herself out of the story, for starters, but told him about the card, the apparent miracle, the teeth sacrifices and the good and bad places.

"It's like I was there," said Max, with a half-shrug. "Ben was a born story teller."

Normal was on the edge of his seat, wide-eyed and fascinated. He picked up his pen and scribbled down a few notes, which he'd forgotten to do during story time.

"I don't want to make this about you, Max, but how does that tie into your life? Your family were strong Evangelical Christians. You're saying that you didn't recognise Mary, the mother of God?"

"Your background check was clearly half-assed," said Max, rolling her eyes. "Did you notice the lack of Ben? They wiped him out as if this could make him cease to exist. Rewrote my family history. They made up that stuff. It's like damage control or something. It's not true, it was never true, that's why I'm calling myself a lapsed Christian and ticked the no religion box on your form."

This was a coincidence, completely unrelated to Ben or the Blue Lady, just details of a complex and rich back-story that ought to throw off Lydecker if she were a runaway. Transgenic were invented by man. There was no whitewashing this fact and it was hard to reconcile that with faith.

"The conspiracy grows," Normal murmured. "How come you were able to walk free, knowing all this? You could have gone straight to the media and not just me."

"Because it's crazy. No one would believe me. At best, I'd also get a one-way ticket to the loony bin but more likely I'd be locked up in their facility, at their mercy. I was only there once and I never want to see it again. I never told them all that stuff. And they paid us off, assuming family loyalty only goes so far, especially when that's the skeleton in the closet."

"The victims…they had their teeth ripped out, didn't they?"

"Yeah."

The killings are either testing the faith of others or sacrifices that she calls for," Normal speculated.

"One of the victims was a Pastor. He wasn't Catholic though. The rest were affiliated to varying degrees with different faiths and branches," said Max.

"None of them believe in Ben's exact version, this so-called Blue Lady, so he isn't necessarily targeting those who worship Mary, just those of faith."

Max shrugged. The Blue Lady didn't save Jack or Eva and they had believed. Any further testing seemed redundant. Clearly, it didn't work. Serial killers were supposed to be logical. It didn't add up. This wasn't even considering Ben stamping his barcode on them all. This she couldn't share with Normal.

"You said before that you wanted to be a potential victim, bait. That this was your endgame."

"Yeah."

"You're in luck. That's very achievable, perhaps inevitable, given that you know the true story," Normal predicted.

Max shivered. She hadn't considered Ben tracking down one of the others. It was reckless, they were equipped to fight him unlike the normal people, but it had a certain poetry that seemed to fit in with Ben's MO.

"You got a plan?"

"You need to unlapse. Convert to Catholicism. Use your fabricated history to your benefit. Play up your transfer to a secular school to study science. Can you arrange it that your parents disowned you for this decision?"

Max was two steps ahead of Normal there. This already happened. It wasn't anything to do with Ben. Max just wanted to make her story airtight. Creating an entire family took work so it was easier to cut them off, give them a reason to deny her existence and set them on the other side of the country if anyone went looking. She had toyed with the orphan approach, but it seemed like that would be too obvious for an escapee, surely Manticore had flagged that.

Max nodded. She could get her fake parent's disapproval without any difficulties.

"Good. Join the local religious community. Prayer circles. Retreats. Helping out at homeless shelters. Do it all. Make your presence felt without sacrificing the controversy. You can research that yourself. Ben comes to town and hits the local churches; you want him to hear the gossip about you. The big twist is that this is all nonsense and you're you."

Funny that Max, who spent her life resenting being bossed around, was happy to get this plan. With this, it was like maybe she could pull off this job. She had a fighting chance. She could do all that stuff and Normal seemed to think it could work. Maybe it wouldn't, but it had potential and she had nothing else going on.

It was a waiting game then.

_Sounds like a decent plan? A new (but familiar) character will be introduced next chapter that will stir things up. Please comment. Like I said, I'm remixing season 1. What do you think? It will become clear sooner when exactly this is taking place and why events in certain episodes are glossed over or pushed back._


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